Our CopperCoat Antifoul Story

In addition to the normal questions on storms, pirates, the cost of sailing and having a child on board, a huge question we get asked is about our experience with CopperCoat antifoul.

CopperCoat is an antifoul paint that is supposed to eliminate the need for a new hull paint job every year.

If you’re new to boating, one of the routine maintenance jobs that must be performed yearly is a new coat of antifoul paint. The paint goes on the bottom of the hull requiring the boat to be craned out and set on the hard.

In some cases, you can stretch an antifoul paint job to two years but beyond that, the traditional antifoul paint won’t work any longer.

And after years of adding one coat of antifoul paint on top of another, you’ll eventually have the big job of scraping it all off and starting over. When my husband, Simon, scrapped our antifoul paint back he had to sand off eight coats. He was called Papa Smurf at the boatyard due to his white cleaning suit being stained with the blue antifoul paint!

Why do you need antifoul paint?

Without it, your hull will attract barnacles and other life forms. Not before long, you’ll have a rug of life living below the water line and boy, will that rug reek havoc. With only a small amount of growth, you’ll easily lose a substantial amount of speed (and let’s face it, sailboats don’t go very fast anyway – loosing a knot of speed is massive). Furthermore, barnacles that grow along the raw water intakes could cause your engine to overheat.

Normal antifoul needs to be applied every couple years at the very least. CopperCoat on the other hand, goes on once and lasts 8 to 10 years…sometimes longer!

Britican at Bennett Brothers Yachts Inc – all old antifoul stripped off

So…CopperCoat antifoul is low maintenance and helps with the boat’s efficiency. What else does it do? Well, it’s an inherently waterproof epoxy resin so it will protect a boat from osmosis. And the antifoul paint causes less harm to marine life than conventional anti-foul paints making it more environmentally friendly.

Considering the traditional antifoul paint versus CopperCoat, let’s apply the costs to Britican. If we took Britican out every other year and had the antifoul paint put on, it would cost us around $3,000 every time, keeping in mind that we’re a 35 ton 56’ sailboat.

Plus there’s the cost of shutting the boat and systems down and finding somewhere else to live while she’s on the hard. And considering we’re a liveaboard family, there’s also the disturbance to family life. We’re essentially being kicked out of our home while our boat is out of the water.

The amount we paid for our CopperCoat antifouling was $11,700.

So, if you consider that over the next 10 years, we would have to spend around $15,000 doing it the ‘traditional’ way by pulling the boat out every two years. With CopperCoat, we’ll save money overall, and a whole lot of time and hassle.

Additionally, our plan is to go into the Pacific. Finding places to haul out the boat are not as easy as in the Mediterranean or the Americas.

THAT’S THE THEORY….that’s not what we’ve experienced thus far. (Make sure to read the article Living Aboard A Boat and watch the video too. We cover this CopperCoat story in the video).

Britican – just before being loaded onto the crane to go back into the water

From day one, we’ve have barnacles and lots of them.

And we learned about barnacles in our raw water intakes the hard way. After our recent CopperCoat job, we took Britican up a river to avoid the full wrath of hurricane Matthew (2016). After 20 minutes of leaving the marina and being massively stressed already, our engine overheated.

Lucky for us, we were able to pull over in a marina and some local’s discovered our problem. Knowing that our raw water intakes were barnacle-ridden, we went up the river as the tide flowed in under low revs. Our obvious question, was ‘why do we have barnacles?’

When returning to the marina, after Matthew had passed, we immediately had a diver down to check out our hull. He reported that hull was full of barnacles. He explained that Charleston Harbor and the surrounding area is full of life. All boats get scrapped at least once a month by divers.

At first we assumed that we must be in bad waters…

…and that it was so bad, the CopperCoat didn’t work. Our diver reported that barnacles grew back on our boat every two months instead of every month so at least there was a small benefit from the CopperCoat.

From my perspective, I thought… ’I didn’t pay $11,700 to have to pay a diver to clean my hull!’ I was fuming but I assumed that it was down to the Charleston water…

And then over time more people asked me about our CopperCoat results.

I told readers to ‘hold tight’ informing them that we’re going to Bermuda for six weeks and we’ll see how CopperCoat performs outside of the terrible Charleston waters.

Anyhoo…much to our dismay, we had a diver scrape our boat the day before leaving for Bermuda. Sadly, barnacles grew on the hull in Bermuda. And the waters in Bermuda are crystal clear blue waters.

Upon returning to Charleston, Simon decided to call CopperCoat and explain to them our results. When hearing our story, Jim from CopperCoat USA explained, ‘there’s something wrong – barnacles should not be on your boat. It must not have been applied correctly.’ The assumption was that the CopperCoat wasn’t sanded enough before being put back in the water. Sanding the paint allows the Copper to emerge – something that the barnacles won’t attach to.

Al, our original project manger, immediately told Simon to bring the boat back and Bennett Brother’s will take the boat out, re-sand the CopperCoat and put the boat back into the water free of charge.

Simon and I thought that it’s a massive inconvenience for us to have to motor/sail the boat back to North Carolina. It’s a 22-hour motor and will cost around $400 in fuel if we have to motor the whole way. Furthermore, our daughter is in school so we need to make the trip during a holiday. And then there’s the question of where are we going to live while the boat is back out of the water.

Yes, it was an inconvenience but things happen. The important thing is to get our CopperCoat working.

Simon then requested that Al put his offering in writing. We didn’t want to motor the boat all the way up to North Carolina and then have some sort of discrepancy.

And that’s when Al started to get a bit strange. He said he’d send the offer in writing and then he didn’t. Al then started to say that it was CopperCoat who are to blame…not the boatyard.

Simon sent videos of our hull to CopperCoat USA and Jim verified that the paint wasn’t sanded enough to expose the Copper.

Simon then chased Al again. Trying to find a solution for everyone, Simon suggested that we bring the boat up to North Carolina just before leaving America for the Caribbean. By then we will take our daughter out of school and revert back to homeschooling AND we have a trip planned to the UK to visit family. We thought it was a good solution for a place for us to live while the boat was out of the water.

Britican heading to the river

Simon mentioned the idea to Al and his response was, yes we can do that but when the boat is not being worked on you have to pay for marina fees.

Eventually, Al sent us the following email:

BBY will not pay anyone to do this work due to the fact that we did the job as / the manufactures specs. and was sanded to their instructions I’m only saying that I will haul and sand the bottom again but offer no warranty past that and do not feel that we should even do it but to offer good customer service . We a BBY are not in any way accepting the notion that we did not do the job correctly.
2 weeks dockage at Cape Fear Marina for Britican would be. $378.00

SO… we’re out of pocket by around $900 in diver fees (to clean our hull every other month). The fuel bill to motor to North Carolina and back could be around $320…and if we need to get a hotel that could be $100/night for X amount of nights AND Bennett Brother’s want us to pay marina fees!

How is this good customer service?

Prior to getting the job done, Al kept saying to us, ‘if there’s any problem at all you just bring the boat back to us and we’ll fix it.’ He also said that they’ve had experience of doing CopperCoat jobs.

From our perspective, we paid a lot of money and we didn’t get the intended result. We then asked the boatyard to fix the problem and they’re saying it’s not them even though the manufacturer of the product verified the issue at hand.

Imagine if we all went to McDonalds and told the server – my bun is hard and the server responded, ‘It must be the bun manufacturers fault’. Or, let’s consider some higher priced purchases…look at new homes. If I complained to a house builder that my paint was peeling in my new house, they wouldn’t tell me that it’s the paint manufacturers fault and they’re not taking responsibility…they would just fix it.

No…as it stands, we’ve paid $11,700 and the boatyard that did it is saying they’re not going to take responsibility for the issues, but they’ll sand the boat for free.

I’m seriously hoping that we can get a stronger commitment from Bennett Brothers Yachts.

Or, better yet, what I’d really like is for Bennett Brothers Yachts to foot the bill locally so that we can get our boat fixed without the massive hassle to take the boat 22 hours north, pay more money in fuel, hotel bills and marina fees.

If Bennett Brother’s has an issue with the manufacturers guidelines, then I feel they should take that up with CopperCoat. We paid for a service, we were told that if it wasn’t right to bring it back and they’d make sure it was done right.

Make sure to read the article Living Aboard A Boat and watch the video too. We cover this CopperCoat story in the video.

What are your thoughts? Please put them below.

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Comments

I’m no expert on coppercoat, having never used it myself due to not having a boat, but just looking at the picture of the hull prior to launch after getting the job done proves to me that it wasn’t done correctly (i study the coppercoatusa website all the time). The surface should have a certain shine to it and be uniform in colour (yes being canadian, I spell words the british way). As well, when the boat is hauled out, it should start to have a greenish tint to the antifoul, if the copper is exposed which I don’t think it is….you would have been better off doing the project yourselves and doing it properly for cheaper.

Having Managed and Operated Boatyards, Marinas and Dockage Facilities in the past…it’s been my experience to see Boatyards, Marinas and Product Manufacturers point their respective fingers in each other’s direction initially when something goes awry.

When it becomes obvious to them that the customer, (in this case, Britican) cannot be satisfied that anything is getting done towards resolving the issue, Then hold on and Batten Down the hatches!
A Pile-on (gang-up) is about to occur on the one party who is most defenseless and has the most to lose. Sadly, I don’t suppose I have to tell you who that might be.
But take heart Britican… The power of numbers and being an Underdog are on your side this time.

Compensation for Time, Expenses ,Pain and Suffering should certainly be justified if it bears out that shoddy workmanship on the Yard’s part or a defective product was used.

I’m curious…

1. Is this a DIY yard? (according to your article, I’m assuming so) If so…How much/which part of the work did Simon do? These types of jobs are extremely labor intensive from the very start. It is completely understandable for any owner to try and save some $ by doing what he/she can do to move things along.
2. Was the bottom inspected in any way after painting/before relaunch by any other parties who might have had a little skin in the game?
3. From whom was the Copper Coat product purchased? Did you BYP (Bring your own paint) or did BB sell it to you? Is it possible that due to the cost of the product..(not a lot of owners can afford the initial outlay of funds for one of these bottom jobs. Especially in the area that you are in…)
that it might have been old stock …or past its shelf life?

Hey Steven…Thank you for your comments. I’m not sure if it is a DIY yard. Simon didn’t do anything – we paid the price for them to do the full project. Once the bottom was cleaned back to gelcoat they kept testing it for moisture. Once the readings were appropriate they said it was good to go. I must note that it was very hot and humid when they did the job. No one surveyed the hull before the work was done – other than Bennett Brothers Yachts Inc. The boatyard purchased the CopperCoat…In fact, they recently told us that if we purchased it, they wouldn’t offer to fix anything. It would be nice to be able to get a positive outcome from all this! Thanks gain for commenting. K.

I think you need to start playing Hard ball with Al. Cost the sanding locally tell Al BBY are paying for it or you’re going to take legal action to recover the total cost of the Copper Coat plus expenses $15000-$20000 (obviously take legal advice) which you may need to do anyway if the sanding doesn’t work, which I suspect it won’t.

If you can get Copper Coat to confirm in writing that in their opinion the job wasn’t done correctly that would be helpful, at the same time find out if BBY are authorised agents of Copper Coat.

Did you pay by credit card, I know there is a certain amount of protection in the UK not sure about The US.

Lastly before you go in guns blazing, point out politely to BBY and Copper Coat that upwards of 10,000 potential customers are watching this sorry saga play out on YouTube.

the problem with a $15-20k suit is 1) it’s too large for small claims in most jurisdictions, 2) too small for most lawyers to consider and 3) if you can find a lawyer, your legal fees will probably exceed the recoverable amount.

don’t know where you are at with the situation. as to the legal amounts. I am finding that I may have to separate claim in order for to qualify for small claims. One suit for initial work and one suit for consequential costs. We did our own coppercoat job in Grenada. first year we had a few small barnacles….yep, we didn’t sand correctly (missed a few spots). we haul out for off season, so back to it with hand sander. been real good for 5yrs now. It may be less stress and cost for you to deal with this yourself. a two day haul and a palm sander and you are good to go. AND…,you do still have to wipe the slim and little bits off the boat every few months.

Same experience with copper coat in the uk 3years in and disappointed with results CopperCoat UK team don’t seem bothered Not even been to look, as promised Its not bad, but its not great Thinking of repainting with normal antifoul this winter . Not met anyone who is pleased with the results

There are a lot of similar stories with marina and boat yard work.
I think most Marina are Mom and Pa businesses and do thinks usually ok. However, most lacks on work order contract writting skills. And us, sailor, are not also paying enough attention to this.

I also had some issues for a rudder bearing jobs. Over the phone, all was ok, free haul out and bla bla bla. Written statement by email. What I did not know is that the guy was selling the boat yard. 4 weeks later when I showed up, guess what…

May be you could use your lawyer skills to work on standard contract templates for boater and make a bit of money selling those.

Classic example !
If you’re not doing boat work yourself & for all other arrangements get it in writing before the work is scheduled to begin & have legal representation in place. Most reputable companies will work with you after an attorney mails a letter to the challenging concern in your behalf.

Kim,
It is sad to hear about the finger pointing game. So similar to technology where the hardware manufacturers want to blame the software makers and the operating system makers want to blame the hardware manufacturers and everyone points a finger not realizing that there are four fingers pointing back at them. Anyway, about 5 years ago, I sanded my little Lancer 25 down of all the nasty multi-color hull paints and splurged on a single batch of the Copper Coat. Being a 25 foot boat, one gallon I guess it was was all that was needed. Anyway, my wife and I followed the directions and basically applied the coats in consecutive roundings of the boat…as one coat gets tacky, you are supposed to apply the next coat…but I am sure you already knew that. Job turned out fantastic and being in the Upper Chesapeake, I have had little to no barnacle growth from year to year. The yard that pulls her every December marvels at the fact that they don’t have to clean the bottom because she looks so good and as the years progress she looks more and more like an old penny. Sorry that you are having such issues with your boat. Maybe the boatyard will surprise you and have a change of heart about standing behind their work.

Suspect the yard did not sand to CopperCoat standards. However as the captain of your ship you bear some responsibility also – since you did not verify the work performed before paying the bill. Old expression rings true, If you want something done right the first time, do it yourself. However, I also get the impression your not DIY types, as you do not live aboard while on the hard – its actually fun and motivates you to get the job done.

Hey Joe – thank you for the link issue. I’ve put a redirect on it so it will now work from YouTube. Joe – we were told over and over again that if it wasn’t right, just bring it back and they’ll fix it. Had we any indication that this was going to happen we would have had an independent person verify the work. And you’re correct – we are not DIY people. We’re getting better every year but we thought we’d let ‘experts’ handle the CopperCoat. I do agree with you – if you want a job done correctly you often do need to do it yourself! Thanks for your comments. K.

Hi Kim,
All I can add to this, is supporting the thought that the application and or preparation was not right. There are tens of thousands of happy boat owners with Coppercoat on their hulls and we are just one if them. Like you, we paid what I consider to be too much for the Coppercoat application. It was thousands of Euro more than the standard antifoul the commissioning yard normally used, and seeing as the extra labour was just to mix the Coppercoat, then put on four coats (we hope!) rather than the normal two of antifoul, it seemed a lot. Admittedly, Coppercoat itself is twice the price of premium ablative, and if the yard normally uses something cheap and nasty, then that would account for more of a price differential.
Anyway, we nearly gave up it was so hard, but we stuck to our guns, and the yard did the Coppercoat work. They also prepared the hull prior to launching by giving the whole Coppercoated area a good burnish.
Our first year, all we had was a bit of yellow slime (not noticable unless you wiped your hand over it). Second year we just had some light furring, and a barnacle up inside one of our through-hulls. Third year (left going nowhere for a full 11 months in a marina with high nutrient, and boats all around us covered in nasty hard fouling), all we had was a bit of ‘mud’ around the waterline that fell off as I brushed my hand over it. Fourth, fifth and sixth years, we have had just a bit of furring here and there, and at one place, a few of those wriggly worm deposits in some patches (like threads, and just wipe off with your finger over them).
So we are extremely glad we went with Coppercoat. It needs a pressure wash or a scrub each year, but that’s all. Our hull looks great and we see no reason not to expect at least 15 years out of our coating – maybe a fair bit more. We sail around the Med, and come across quite a few Coppercoated hulls in our travells – they all look like ours – great!
I expect in the next few years we may have to give the hull a light sand to reactivate, but after six years now, there is no sign of that need yet. Sure beats the time, hassle and expense of annual antifouling hands down.
My only other thought is that while they were applying your Coppercoat, it was not constantly mixed in the trays, and some copper ended up in the bottom of the trays, rather than on your hull.. That would do it also. But if all of the copper went on your hull, AND they applied ‘wet on tacky’, rather than letting some coats cure too much before applying the next, then it can only be lack of burnishing prior to launch. If that is the case, then either give it time (is your hull going a dark brown and/or green oxide colour?) to oxidise, or go over with a commercial Scotch Brite pad to scuff the top layer of resin off and expose copper so that it can oxidise. I can’t see a way of including images in this response, but if you like, I can e-mail some of our hull, so you can see how yours should look after the Coppercoat is fully oxidised.

Thank you for this David…and I’m so pleased to hear your good results with CopperCoat. We have so many friends that have it and say it’s the best thing they did. So – you can imagine our disappointment. Yes – please send me your photos. I just wonder if we can get our diver to sand the hull while Britican is still in the water?! Of course, however, we’re not questioning everything the Bennett Brothers Yachts Inc did – we wonder if they mixed the CopperCoat correctly? Did they actually use CopperCoat? Did they apply it when it was too hot or humid? OR…is it just that they didn’t sand it back?! To me, the hull still looks a Copper color. When we were in Bermuda last month and went swimming around the boat I did’t notice the hull being green – it looks more like what she looked like in the photos (on land) but now with barnacles on her 🙁 Thanks so much for taking the time to comment.

Hi Kim,
Sorry for the delay – a bit busy the last few days. I have dug out some photos for you, showing our boat at the beginning of this season, then when hauled at the end prior to washing, and then after washing. There doesn’t seem to be any way of posting the photos here however. How should I get them to you?
As a note, looking at your photos again, that finish does seem to be quite patchy. Makes me question whether the product was applied four coats wet on tacky, or whether enough was applied. I just checked, and there should have been at least 18 litres of Coppercoat going on your hull.
The other thing is regarding sanding the surface – try to use a commercial ‘Scotchbrite’ style of pad, as being soft, it will get into the texture on the surface of your hull, rather than just taking the top off, and leaving the depressions of the texture un-touched. All you want to do is scuff off the resin from the top of the copper – not actually remove any copper, which sanding tends to do. So far we have not touched ours (the yard which did the job from new prepared the Coppercoat prior to the first launch back in 2012, and that is it). It may be that in the next couple of years, we have to abrade the hull to freshen up the Coppercoat, but so far it is looking pretty much like it did after the first season. Let me know how to get those photos to you, so you can see yourself.
Bye for now,
David

Hey David! Thanks for all this info. You can send photos to my email address (Kim@SailingBritican.com). A representative from CopperCoat is actually going to be with us at the boatyard when we take Britican out. He’s going to check out the state of the hull and then oversea the sand job (if it is a sanding that’s needed). Thanks for this David 🙂

Hi Kim
If the boat is still a BROWN copper colour it’s definitely not working! Your epoxy is covering all the Copper. The entire surface needs abraiding to allow the copper to come in contact with the seawater. It will then turn a greenish colour, and it’ll start working (assuming of course that the boat yard did actually use CopperCoat. There are lots of imitations out there, which perhaps are not as good).
All it needs to abraid it is some ScotchBrite pads. It will probably take a day (or possibly 2 days) for the two of you to go over the entire hull. That would be far more cost and time effective than going back to a boat yard you no longer trust!

For a low cost solution I’d be inclined first to partially careen the boat and sand an area on one side to Copper Coat’s specification to verify if that is in fact the problem. You would also gain some material that could be checked for authenticity (perhaps).

Hi Kim
So sorry to hear of your Copper Coa probelms. We have a 40′ steel ketch based in Gosport (Solent) and decided to CopperCoat 18 months ago. We decided to do it as a family project with my wife and daughter mixing and stirring virtually continuosly each batch while my son and I worked opposite each side of the hull, when we finished towards the stern we would then start again at the bow. On a 40′ long keel hull the curing time was just about perfect for the “sticky” suface to then take the next coat. In the end we had enough to do 5 coats. The key points have already been mentioned above but just to reiterate 1. Use enough labour and do both sides together and have a team of mixers and stirrers that resupply when the roller tray is gettting low. 2. A good sanding after the final coat has cured is essential – the finish before going back into the water should look like sanded varnish on wood i.e whiteish – it should definaltley not be shiny like finished varnish on wood.
Our CopperCoat has been excellent and we’re just about to dry out on a drying post and give the hull a wash to take a thin coat of slime off.
I believe as your previous bloggers have intimated that once the hull has been sanded or abraided properly – your barnicle story will be consigned to the history books of wisdom.
Btw – if you are in doubt as to whether BBY did use CopperCoat ask to see a copy of their purchase invoice. It should dated around the time you had ‘Britcan’ done. Just a thought. And Good luck with the remedial work – get the CopperCoat working first and then pursue the legal element at your leisure later. 🙂

Thanks for this Greg – I’m getting similar stories like yours from people around the world. I appreciate you taking the time to write this and I’m sure that CopperCoat does too. Great idea about finding out if BBY purchased CopperCoat. Lastly…Simon’s dad lives in Gosport – right next to the new-ish Aldi in Jacana Court. He looks over the marina. Perhaps when we visit in Oct/Nov we should meet up for a beer. Thanks for commenting. K.

Hi Kim,
I Coppercoated my Sabre 27 three years ago. Best thing I have ever done to boat. I’m moored in the upper reaches of the Milford Haven waterway – renowned for heavy fouling, most conventional antifoul barely lasted a season, and always had barnacle growth by the Autumn.
Since the Copper coat went on a quick blast with the power washer when she’s hauled out (there’s always a bit of slimy stuff on there) and she’s as clean as a whistle.
Looking at your pictures I get the impression that it has not been applied correctly. When finished (I put on 5 coats) the hull should be an EVEN colour. Yours looks patchy. This suggests that it was probably applied in layers that were too think and/or coats had gone off and dried before the next coat was applied. Each coat should still be ‘tacky’ when the next coat is applied. In warm conditions this can happen fast. When my wife and I did ours we had to keep going without a break until all five coats were on, and we weren’t working in temperatures above 15°C! I reckon your yard probably had too few men on the job, and they took too many tea breaks!
If Copper coat is working it should have turned a dull greenish colour, if it hasn’t done that it has been applied incorrectly.
Hope you come to some agreement to get it rectified.
Best of luck
Andy

Michael – I asked your question to the head of CopperCoat USA and this is his answer: “Have them look up Schooner Mahdee and their blog. They have had Coppercoat for 9 or 10 years now and have written several articles in wooden boat forums about it and the application process. Coppercoat has been doing wooden boats for 25 years now.”

Sorry to hear about your misfortune. We applied CopperCoat ourself on our 29ft sailboat at the beginning of this season. So far, at the end of the 2017 season, I am very pleased with the results: only a thin layer of slime and nothing else. The change of colour did show very fast, after about a week in the water it changed to a dark brownish-green colour. I used Scotchbrite pads to sand the CopperCoat, but used an orbital machine for it. Even on our relative small boat the sanding is quite a job, let alone doing it all by hand. The fully cured CopperCoat is rock-hard, you need quite some effort to remove the epoxy and expose the copper.

Please keep in mind that if CopperCoat is past it’s shelf-date the epoxy may not cure completely (and you may suffer from ‘delamination’) but this cannot affect it’s anti-fouling capabilities. The copper powder does not age and is still there, no matter how old the resin is.

I hope things work out well for you. Regards, Timo s/y il Cigno The Netherlands

Hi Kim
Have you written a final resulation of your issue? Or is it only in videos.
From all the reading and other investigations it appears the final sanding was the issue and having worked in boatyards I suspect they were carful not to sand too hard and should have sanded much harder! A all day job for 2 guys not a hour of scuffing.
To be fair coppercoat should have some sort of method of showing the sanding is done right like a before and after closeup photo samples so the yard know how to get it right….but since they said they were experts with coppercoat………they should have known what to do!
Cheers warren

Hey Warren…no, I have not written a final resolution. As it stands now, all the areas that were touched-up when Britican was taken out in Charleston have no growth at all. All the areas that were not touched up have barnacles. Coppercoat is telling us that we have to scour the bottom with green pads. Simon used a couple tanks and did it one week ago. It took him hours and wasn’t easy. I’m going to document how the growth builds up with a weekly video diary. I have to say that our expectations have not been met and at this point CopperCoat has been more of a hassle and far more costly than the traditional route 🙁

Kim, We have a 15-year-old Hallberg Rassy 43, and after all those years the bottom paint was peeling. So last winter we had Osprey Marine (Deale, MD) soda blast and apply Coppercoat. After launch in the spring, it unfortunately (due to many reasons) simply sat in the slip for 6 weeks. Once we were finally able to get sailing, we noticed heavy fouling–about 3/8″ think coating of slime over the whole hull, and a few tiny barnacles too. Everything scraped off easily, but I was perplexed–was this normal? Well, speaking with Osprey and Coppercoat–no, it is not! Even after 6 weeks in a slip, the worst we should have had was a thin layer of slime. Well, Coppercoat is blaming poor prep from Osprey, and Osprey is claiming they did everything right. So now the fight begins… Next time we get to the boat I’m going to take pics and send to Coppercoat. Based on reading a lot of these comments, I suspect the boat was not prepped properly–the color of the hull is NOT green at all, but a nice shiny copper color. If I can get that verified by Coppercoat then perhaps I can convince Osprey to re-prep the hull at their expense. Hopefully, like you, we can get this taken care of without involving the nasty lawyers!

Hey Mike… I’ll put put an update soon regarding CopperCoat as our saga continues! The head of CopperCoat USA (Jim) supervised our last lift out and went around the boat saying that around 12 spots had to be either sanded or touched up. We got the work done by the original boatyard. The boatyard just didn’t apply the CopperCoat correctly the first time around. Needless to say, all the areas that were touched up now have no growth and no slime. Great news – isn’t it? HOWEVER, all the areas that were not touched up are full of growth, slime and barnacles. CopperCoat UK has agreed to pay for the CopperCoat paint to fix this issue but Jim at CopperCoat USA, who supervised the touch-up job seems reluctant to want to fund the rest of what should have been done in the first place. I believe that original boatyard did an improper job HOWEVER we can’t now go back to them and ask them to do the bit of the boat that wasn’t done. It was Jim at CopperCoat USA that signed off on it. SOOOOOOOO…moral of the story is that even if the boatyard doesn’t do a good job you can’t relied on CopperCoats own employees/franchise owners to do it either. Throughout this whole debacle the people at CopperCoat UK have been fantastic with us. Regarding Jim on the USA side, I cannot say the same. We’ve never been so disappointed in a service ever. KIM

Hi Kim, sorry to hear that Coppercoat did not worked for you. I am 100% sure that the application was done incorrectly or that the product might have exceeded the shelf live (1 year). We have absolutely fantastic results here in Scandinavia (Norway, Denmark and Sweden) with Coppercoat. Everyone i talked to, including me with my own Hallberg Rassy in Norway and a Oyster in Greece, can confirm that there is nothing similar or working like Coppercoat on the market. Still no marine growth at all – after 6 and 8 years. I still recommend everyone Coppercoat! Crossing fingers that the Coppercoat headquarter guys will find a solution for you!

Thank you for your comments Ståle! I just responded to someone else that recently commented on this post. I agree with you – the boatyard did an improper job…but the head of CopperCoat USA has made things even worse. Read the following…

“I’ll put put an update soon regarding CopperCoat as our saga continues! The head of CopperCoat USA (Jim) supervised our last lift out and went around the boat saying that around 12 spots had to be either sanded or touched up. We got the work done by the original boatyard (The paint and labor were free of charge to us). The boatyard just didn’t apply the CopperCoat correctly the first time around. Needless to say, all the areas that were touched up now have no growth and no slime. Great news – isn’t it? HOWEVER, all the areas that were not touched up are full of growth, slime and barnacles. CopperCoat UK has agreed to pay for the CopperCoat paint to fix this issue but Jim at CopperCoat USA, who supervised the touch-up job seems reluctant to want to fund the rest of what should have been done in the first place. I believe that the original boatyard did an improper job HOWEVER we can’t now go back to them and ask them to do the bit of the boat that wasn’t done. It was Jim at CopperCoat USA that signed off on it. SOOOOOOOO…moral of the story is that even if the boatyard doesn’t do a good job you can’t relied on CopperCoats own employees/franchise owners to do it either. Throughout this whole debacle the people at CopperCoat UK have been fantastic with us. Regarding Jim on the USA side, I cannot say the same. We’ve never been so disappointed in a service ever. KIM”

Kim:
I am very sorry to hear about the problems you encountered with work done at Bennett Brothers Yachts. I too have an Oyster 56 and my boat was at Bennett Brothers at the same time your boat was there. If you review your first picture on this thread you can see off the starboard side of your transom, the aft end of my blue hulled boat. At that time it was named “Mystic Pearl” and is now called “Kelly Girl.” I brought my boat to Bennett Brothers in 2015 , where the boat was to undergo a substantial refit and dealt extensively with Al Noble. Having been assured that Bennett Brothers could do the work properly and on schedule, I gave them the job. I even flew Al Noble to Rhode Island to inspect the boat while out of the water and evaluate the scope of the work to be done. After two years in to a 6-8 month projected project timeline and way over the projected budget, I finally was advised to remove the boat. The boat was removed and brough to Annapolis, MD to have all of the problems and deficiencies created by Bennett Brothers corrected. It took us about 5 months, with 6 independent contractors (engine mechanic, interior upholsterer, canvas maker, wood worker, rigger, and general engineer) and about $100,000 to have the defective work redone properly. Like you, Bennett Brothers misrepresented themselves by saying they were experts in all facets of my refit. Not true. For example, they represented they were competent at installing Leisure Furl Systems. Point in fact was that mine was their first Leisure Furl install and they screwed mine up royally. Regrettably, unlike your copper manufacturer, the most Leisure Furl did for me was to recommend a competent Leisure Furl rigger who then spent months correcting all of the Bennett Brother’s mistakes on their Leisure Furl system install. I could go on. I am currently in litigation with Bennett Brothers for much the same general reasons you are. Misrepresentation, piss poor workmanship and the inability and unwillingness to correct the problems. Others have mentioned and you have acknowledged getting into litigation with Bennett Brothers. If I can be of assistance to you or others that have been aggrieved by Bennett Brothers Yachts, please feel free to contact me. Of note there are other potential Class Action matters that I am evaluating against Bennett Brothers and would be happy to discuss this with others. I am so glad you have spoken out on this issue. I have seen other very negative Bennett Brothers reviews and comments as to why more aggrieved parties are not also speaking out. I can be reached at Allan Lesser, 301-442-6923, allanlesser@comcast.net

As devoted — and avid — DIY’ers I can say sometimes the simplest easiest thing is just to do whatever you want to be done yourself. I am one of the owners of the Schooner Mahdee (blog.mahdee.com) where (as mentioned above) you will indeed find Coppercoat on a 1931-built wood boat. We applied the Coppercoat in late 2008 and re-launched the boat in early 2009. It is not difficult to apply — I did it solo, just me, myself and I (since my husband was busy with other things) managed to pour, stir and apply as needed on our 54′ ft 30T boat. If I can do it, anyone can do it. I had a young high school kid helping but sent him off to do other tasks because it really IS easy to do all by yourself. Nice to have a helper of course but not 100% needed.

We had replanked the boat during a major rebuild prior to applying the Coppercoat and so we hauled out for fairing of seams and applying paint (above and below the waterline, all the painted hull) in the spring of 2010 (one year after launch) and at that time, we raised the waterline and painted on a black 5″ bootstripe at/above the waterline. Because we’re wood — and some of it very very old old wood — we did have problems with the Coppercoat not adhering to a few small areas on the wood keelson. Those problems will remain because of the various things on/in the wood in those areas. Nothing to do with the actual bottom paint as it adhered beautifully to the newer planking wood. Also had problems adhering to the bronze rudderstock and a few other bronze bits–but I spoke with Jim at Coppercoat USA who advised that I’d probably not gotten sufficient tooth (I left the surface too smooth) on that bronze — so I redid it in 2013 and it seems to have stayed on this go’round. Here’s a couple pics of it when we were launching and when we were re-doing the bronze bits (see yellow primer), the bootstripe (see bare wood) and wood keelson/deadwood (see exposed red lead primer)

In the fall of 2013 we hauled out to check the hull and at that time we removed our black bootstripe which had the habit of picking up and growing seagrass on long ocean passages and we applied Coppercoat in its place. The Coppercoat definitely works well as an antifoul. We’re on the west coast and we have been all up and down it from Baja to Alaska and back and forth with many high foul areas. If moored in muddy rivers and sloughs with a good bit of current, we note the silt can get slung onto the boat and if that dirt is not wiped away every few months, barnacles can happen (this happened to us in 2012 when we left the boat in a muddy high current slough for a year but didn’t clean the hull for a particular 6 month period of it) and that was totally my husband and I just not getting out there to wipe away the mud — it was asymmetric mud on port aft and starboard bow that picked up mud (and barnacle) due to the currents of the tides. At that same time, we noticed that we had a black coating on much of the hull and never did decide if it were an algae or a copper oxide with the iron in the river silt (iron in dirt together with copper gives an inert black oxide). We just got out some scotchbright type scrubbers and scrubbed it off. That mud did give us barnacles though we’ve not had them before or since really.

And here’s the incredibly GOOD bit about Coppercoat: Whether or not your original boatyard did a good job applying, you (you and your spouse) have 100% ability to just get out there — in the water for heavens sakes if you do not want to haul the boat– this is NOT rocket science nor is it something that takes superhuman effort — and scrub or sand the boat bottom to reveal the copper so it can turn nice and green and start doing its job. It would be very difficult to imagine that you cannot get to good surface with a bit of sanding or scubbing.

When I did the application “touch up” in 2010, I wasn’t as careful as I had been the previous year and a few areas stayed brownish red for a long, long time and we figured the copper was not able to do its job. The fix? My husband dove on the boat and scrubbed it and that was that. Except for the muddy 2012 time which took another full boat scrub to deal with.

Having said all that — you will have to clean your hull. This is not a “no maintenance” boat bottom. It is a “long time between painting” boat bottom. There is a difference and truly I don’t know anyone (anyone at all) who does not have a diver (or themselves) cleaning their hull from time to time.

Since our boat is 30+tons (32 on the scale at 2013 haulout) and it is big (54′ on deck, 69′ sparred length) it is not cheap to haul out — therefore everything that can be done in the water IS done in the water. We have not hauled since 2013 and it will be our use of a traditional old-style topsides paint (not the bottom paint) which will bring us to haul out the next go-round as far as we can tell. To someone who sailed from San Diego to San Francisco bay area (90 hours underway) in 2010 for a haulout at a DIY yard that had a crane to handle our large boat — and who again sailed from San Diego to San Francisco (another 90 hours of sailing and motorsailing) to do it again in 2013, I totally get it that you don’t want to go 22 hours back to the original yard — but of course I’m thinking “22 hours? ha! that’s nothing!” compared to the long distances we’ve traveled to haul out at a yard we wished to haul in.

Enough of all that. Everyone’s experience is different. Sometimes there’s no absolute on a “wrong party” who simply must help you because of their mistakes and if someone gives people helping them a hard time (e.g. I read above that you are now not pleased with the assistance you received from Jim at Coppercoat USA) then there is little reason for anyone to even be willing to help you ever in the future. It is a sad situation but that’s the way things are. Sometimes there IS a wrong party but the easier thing to do is just deal with the situation yourself and move along with other more positive things to do with your time.

You are very fortunate that this IS Coppercoat and that you can either burnish/sand/scrub the bottom or you can haul out and VERY EASILY YOURSELF fix it! Have the boat pressure washed, go round and sand it to the surface prep you’d like and then apply Coppercoat and you’ll be done with it. Or — take the 22 hours and get back to the first yard so they can do it over properly. I’d suggest working WITH them and not blaming them — perhaps it was the first time that crew had applied Coppercoat? perhaps not. It WAS the first time you’d seen it so you and your spouse as owners of the boat must not have realized that you were accepting something as done when it was not quite right. Its still all an easy fix in comparison to all the other things that a boatyard can do incorrectly on your boat and which you have little recourse to get them or anyone else to repair. This issue — the Coppercoat — cannot possibly be all that difficult. I hope you’ve gotten through this and have moved on to other more positive things.

Best of luck to you in all your boating endeavors and in the care of your boat overall.

Thank you for this Brenda…there’s a lot here and I appreciate your time for writing this. Our CopperCoat story is currently being updated right now…it’s getting sanded down again. I’ll update things soon and include your advice. Thank you! Kim

We had copper coat applied in St. Martin while our Leopard 47 was being repaired thanks to hurricane Irma. The yard had experience in applying it and put five coats on and sanded to specifications. Within two weeks of being back in the water we needed a diver. Ok, we thought, the lagoon isn’t ideal so let’s see how it does in the clear water in Martinique. Same thing, covered with barnacles. This time i cleaned the hull. In Tobago, same thing, as in Trinidad. We are diving and scraping every two weeks. I wish I had never heard of the stuff. We are considering putting a traditional hard paint on top of the copper crap.

Hey Fred…we just had more coats of CopperCoat applied (supplied FOC by CopperCoat) and had it sanded down again. We’re at Peakes in Trinidad. Just went back in the water a week ago so we’ll see how this attempt goes…

I have my boat in Olhao marina in the Algarve, in this Ria Formosa Lagoon it’s very difficult to keep your hull clean barnacles coral oysters and all sort of things will grow on your hull.
I have tried all sorts of antifouling but still needed to take the boat out of the water and do a lot of work so, when I bought this 33 classic I decided I did not want to have to paint the bottom every year and decided to apply copper coat, I did the job in 2011 and never had to worry again all I have to do is once a year lift the boat and pressure clean the hull but it back in the water the same day and its good for another year.
I feel sorry for the ones copper coat doesn’t work but for me, it’s an amazing product when I lift the boat only has velvet that comes off with a wash

And that’s why it’s so frustrating when it doesn’t work. We keep trying different things. We’re pulling the boat out for the third time in a month so that we can once again try to do something different to get it to work. As it stands now…we have to clean the hull every week to rid ourselves of thousands of barnacles 🙁 Thanks for your comments Domingos. Kim

As one who is considering copper coating I find this an interesting thread. It’s interesting because it seems to mirror other similar threads, i.e for some it works and for others not but nobody seems to know why not even CopperCoat!.

Where I am currently opinion / results seem to be equally split.

I do wonder if there is an electrical dimension to this, would be interesting to know what else is under water that could produce weak electric current i.e anodes other metal fittings etc. for both the case where it works and the ones where it doesn’t.
One thing I did discover while mulling over the cost benefits of making my own copper epoxy antifoul is that there are various forms and sizes of copper powder, so a question might be how consistent is the copper supplied in these kits? and does it make a difference anyway?

Finally I also wonder if anybody has considered jet blasting copper powder straight onto wet epoxy, it seems to me that this way one would get very high copper concentration on the surface, just where it is needed.

Doesn’t really help with Briticans immediate problems, more thoughts for anybody else reading this thread looking for solutions.

Thanks for this Tony… I’m also wondering if there’s an electrical dimension? We are literally attracting barnacles! Is it possible we have an energy leak? How can we test for this or investigate? We are going to haul out again next month making it the third time…we’ve resanded the coppercoat, we’ve applied it all over again and then resanded again. We’ve done everything we’ve been told THREE TIMES and we have more barnacles than a boat with no antifoul has! If you have any suggestions on the electricity side of things let me know… Kim

Well if electrically related it may be due to a lack of an energy leak rather than a leak :-).

Q1 what is the keel construction / metal

Q2 What do you have in the way of anodes on the hull and how are they connected ?

Q3 What is the propshaft material and how is it bonded (or not)

It would be interesting to get the same info from anybody that has a working copper coat solution, might point to a pattern.

Finally I have seen many references to “burnishing” copper coat, sanding in my book is NOT burnishing, sanding would leave a much coarser surface than burnishing, burnishing is more a coarse polish such as would be achieved with wire wool.

Is this important? maybe things I have read about marine organism growth suggest that the degree of roughness of a surface is critical in the ability of micro-organism attachment. Ideally I believe one needs to get the equivalent of a polished copper surface.

Hey Tony…I need to ask Simon what the answers are to your questions and get back to you… I think you raise a very interesting point about ‘burnishing’ versus ‘sanding’. It looks like we might haul out in Antigua at the end of this month. I need to get as much info as I can so that we can test things. Simon did start doing tests on sanding different areas of the boat (and burnishing) to see if it made a difference as to how quickly the barnacles came back. What’s really interesting is that after the CopperCoat USA guy came and told the boatyard what to touch-up and how to touch-up…all the patches that were done had little to no barnacles (once back in the water)…but the rest of the boat was again, covered. I told CopperCoat – look…what you suggested worked, however, it wasn’t these small patches that needed to be done, it was the whole darn boat! I then got this long note that the reason the patches seemed to work is that it was new paint. Does that make sense?! So CopperCoat UK gave us all new paint to totally redo the boat again and now we’re back to square one. I really need to put together all the stuff we’ve gone through with this product (and the people that sell the product)! I could have had a very nice brand new car for the money we’ve spent! Thanks for your time on this Tony 🙂 Kim

A working copper bottom should turn green after a period of time, this is known as patination, however this under normal use may take a while. The following website gives a few processes to speed it up,

If when you next come out the bottom is not “green / blue then it may be worth using one of these, if using such a technique you can’t get the coating to patinate on the hard then it may point to a problem with the coating and / or application technique.

Coming back to the burnishing / sanding issue, it is worth thinking about what the coating consists of.

The coating is epoxy with what should be a very high density of copper particles uniformly distributed within the epoxy, a large number of particles should be close to the surface of the epoxy when it has cured. The burnishing process only has to remove the few microns of epoxy which is covering the copper particles, using a relatively coarse sanding medium will likely take off much more than is necessary, I think that polishing with a polishing mop using any of the automotive type paint cutting / polishing pastes should be more than adequate.

Now just to remind you that I have not currently any real life experience of using this stuff.before I go on with another thought :
My feeling is that if this is going to work I would expect it to be electrically conductive i.e connecting an ohm meter to two points anywhere on the coating should indicate continuity, the lower the resistance the more copper is available on the surface what is a good value?? frankly haven’t a clue but less than a Meg ohm over a distance of a couple of feet feels about right.

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